Twenty years ago when I began my journey from Atheism to faith in Christ, nearly all conversations about God included debate or at least a discussion of evidences for the rational foundation for faith.  American cultural postmodernism has altered the way most younger people view the role of debate and discussion.  While Christians need to be “bi-lingual,” speaking both the new language of postmodernity while still able to defend the faith with traditional dialogical processes, when it comes to postmodern witness, a new emphasis on wonder is needed. 

In the past such words as “mystery, wonder, the unknown, and awe” immediately raised red flags for hearers.  Such concepts were seen as holes or limits on one’s ability to demonstrate the rationality of propositional claims.  Subjective experiences that express mystery and wonder today are not only welcome elements of Christian witness but are now often seen as evidence for the personal relevancy of faith to our hearers.

True wonder, or the state in which a person is filled with a sense of awe, comes from experiences with the Divine, albeit an inescapably subjective experience.  In fact, it is this articulation of wonder and its associated outward expressions (e.g. fear, immobilization, spontaneous worship, brokenness, demonstrative repentance…) that mark the unique experiences of women and men throughout the Scripture when confronted with the Divine.  Two great examples of this come from Mark 5 in the exorcism of the Gerasene demoniac and the resurrection of Jairus’ daughter.

Our experience of God may not always be as acute as our mountain top or defining encounters with God but true Christians should be marked as people of wonder for we relate to God in an on-going fashion.  Our relationship with God should go beyond rituals such as prayer, Bible study, and fasting and should include actual encounters with the Divine.  This is the one universal thread that draws the Biblical narrative together across characters from Genesis to Revelation.  This should come as no surprise since God is in the business of encountering His creation.  Such encounters are inherently “alien” and produce the kind of reactions we see in the Biblical narrative (again, fear, flight, spontaneous worship…).  While it is true that we are God’s offspring, He is our Father, there is something so terrifying about the Divine presence that we are left with few voluntary, rational responses in the immediate moment.

When it comes to relating our understanding of and encounters with God to others, there is great value in our transparency in this area.  In fact, the current cultural milieu is so desperate to mystically connect with the Divine, the hunger to hear such encounters amongst crowds and individuals is palpable.  While this opens the door to all kinds of deceptions and potential manipulations, authentic wonder and delight in mystery within the Christian faith is an asset, not a liability.  Seeking to root our experiences and the interpretation of such experiences in Scripture cannot be overstated but such authentic, transformative encounters with God are not confined to Scripture reading.  We cannot manufacture such experiences but hope and wait for God to ‘condescend’ and connect with our hungering hearts.